"'T was the same little house her father had built him when he was a bachelor, with one livin'-room, and a little mite of a bedroom out of it where she slept, but 't was neat as a ship's cabin. There was some old chairs, an' a seat made of a long box that might have held boat tackle an' things to lock up in his fishin' days, and a good enough stove so anybody could cook and keep warm in cold weather....Joanna had done one thing very pretty. There was a little piece o'swamp on the island where good rushes grew plenty, and she'd gathered 'em, and braided some beautiful mats for the floor and a thick cushion for the long bunk. She'd showed a good deal of invention; you see there was a nice chance to pick up pieces o'wood and boards that drove ashore, and she'd made good use o'what she found. There was n't no clock, but she had a few dishes on a shelf, and flowers set about in shells fixed to the walls...."
---Sarah Orne Jewett, The Country of the Pointed Firs (1896)
In this section of Jewett's The Country of the Pointed Firs (1896) we hear the painful story of Joanna Todd, the cousin by marriage of main character Almira Todd. Jilted by her fiance, Joanna is so distraught over her fate that she determines that she can no longer reside within the community. Relocating to "Shell Heap Island," she takes up residence in her father's bachelor house, were she lives as a hermit until her death. As she explains, her extreme bitterness and complete loss of "hope" not only make her "want to be alone" but make her unfit for social life. Joanna's makeshift efforts at domesticating her home, as recorded above, evidence her innovation, but also the loss of the true creative power which is inextricably tied to hope--the idea that the future will be better than the past. Joanna understands such hope as a prerequisite for community life.
Joanna's island home is a dream home not because it represents something utopian, but because it represents something universal. When the narrator of the story makes a pilgrimage to Shell-Heap Island, decades after Joanna's death, only a foundation of stones from her home and a few flowers from the garden remain. Yet as her commentary suggests, this kind of island home resides in all of us in the more figurative sense: "In the life of life of each of us, I said to myself, there is a place remote and islanded, and given to endless regret or secret happiness; we are each the uncompanioned hermit and recluse of an hour or a day; we understand our fellows of the cell to whatever age of history they may belong." Our fellows of the cell....love that, Jewett.
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Thursday, March 25, 2010
Dream House Part I: Nests
"If we go deeper into daydreams of nests, we soon encounter a sort of paradox of sensibility. A nest--and this we understand right away---is a precarious thing, and yet it sets us to daydreaming of security. Why does this obvious precariousness not arrest daydreams of this kind? The answer to this paradox is simple: when we dream...in a sort of naive way, we relive the instinct of the bird, taking pleasure in accentuating the mimetic features of the green nest in green leaves. We definitely saw it, but we say that it is well hidden. This center of animal life is concealed by the immense volume of vegetable life. The nest is a lyrical bouquet of leaves...when we examine a nest, we place ourselves at the origin of confidence in the world, we receive a beginning of confidence, an urge toward cosmic confidence. Would a bird build its nest if it did not have its instinct for confidence in the world?"
---Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of Space
The next few entries will feature utopian homes. In this entry taken from philosopher Gaston Bachelard's The Poetics of Space, the nest is not simply a dream home, but a home that catalyzes reveries of security, in spite of its essential insecurity. The nest of the real world--constructed of natural ephemera---is fragile and vulnerable. Yet the nest exists not only in the real world but in our imagination as an ideal space that is protective and intimate as well as open and ethereal.
A few days ago, I saw a broken egg on the cement beneath a tree. But this disturbing sight conjured the nest from which it had came and then, comically, the Swiss Family Robinson (a family in a nest in a tree) and finally a house on a mountain top. To reside on top of the world, surrounded by a "lyrical bouquet of leaves," would be the ultimate domesticity. Cosmic....confidence!
---Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of Space
The next few entries will feature utopian homes. In this entry taken from philosopher Gaston Bachelard's The Poetics of Space, the nest is not simply a dream home, but a home that catalyzes reveries of security, in spite of its essential insecurity. The nest of the real world--constructed of natural ephemera---is fragile and vulnerable. Yet the nest exists not only in the real world but in our imagination as an ideal space that is protective and intimate as well as open and ethereal.
A few days ago, I saw a broken egg on the cement beneath a tree. But this disturbing sight conjured the nest from which it had came and then, comically, the Swiss Family Robinson (a family in a nest in a tree) and finally a house on a mountain top. To reside on top of the world, surrounded by a "lyrical bouquet of leaves," would be the ultimate domesticity. Cosmic....confidence!
Sunday, March 21, 2010
A Worn-Out Baseball
"When my father's father died in the French Quarter of New Orleans sixty years ago, the popularly accepted story was that on a humid night in mid-August, he had eaten a dozen bananas and then taken a cold bath. He was a man of eighty-seven whose life had been a strenuous assertion of his appetites, and this explanation suited him, just as it suited his friends in the French Quarter. It would be more satisfying to me, it would allow me to feel that I owned my illness, if my urologist were to say: 'You know, you've beat the hell out of this prostate of yours. It looks like a worn-out baseball.' Nobody wants an anonymous illness. I'd much rather think that I brought it on myself than that it was a mere accident of nature."
---Anatole Broyard, "Doctor, Talk to Me"
Today's selection is taken from On Doctoring: Stories, Poems, Essays edited by Richard Reynolds, MD and John Stone, MD (with Lois LaCivita Nixon PhD, M.P.H. and Delese Wear, PhD). This book is given to all first year medical students in the United States and includes literary works (plays, poems, short stories, excerpts) by dozens of well-known authors on the subject of doctoring and what it entails. Some of these authors, such as the American modernist poet, William Carlos Williams, were doctors themselves and share their unique insights into the doctor-patient relationship.
Broyard is both wise and humorous in acknowledging the importance of fitting the diagnosis to the patient's needs and personality. This does not entail misconstruing the illness, but rather shaping the narrative of that illness so that it is consistent with the life of the suffering subject. This is not a small distinction. In the case of Broyard's grandfather who over-indulged, the tale of the bananas and cold baths that brought him to his death is wildly improbable, yet nonetheless "fits" the character of the man. His death, far from happening to him, is cast simply as the natural culmination of a life lived at a high pitch.
In the similar case of Broyard himself, it is clear that he desires agency. He does not want the doctor's reassurance that his prostate cancer is not his fault, a mere chance or accidental happening. Rather, he wants to know that his prostate was expended--hilariously "beat" (got to love that verb choice) through over-use. As Broyard concludes, "If only the patient could be allowed to see his illness as not so much a failure of his body as a natural consumption of it."
---Anatole Broyard, "Doctor, Talk to Me"
Today's selection is taken from On Doctoring: Stories, Poems, Essays edited by Richard Reynolds, MD and John Stone, MD (with Lois LaCivita Nixon PhD, M.P.H. and Delese Wear, PhD). This book is given to all first year medical students in the United States and includes literary works (plays, poems, short stories, excerpts) by dozens of well-known authors on the subject of doctoring and what it entails. Some of these authors, such as the American modernist poet, William Carlos Williams, were doctors themselves and share their unique insights into the doctor-patient relationship.
Broyard is both wise and humorous in acknowledging the importance of fitting the diagnosis to the patient's needs and personality. This does not entail misconstruing the illness, but rather shaping the narrative of that illness so that it is consistent with the life of the suffering subject. This is not a small distinction. In the case of Broyard's grandfather who over-indulged, the tale of the bananas and cold baths that brought him to his death is wildly improbable, yet nonetheless "fits" the character of the man. His death, far from happening to him, is cast simply as the natural culmination of a life lived at a high pitch.
In the similar case of Broyard himself, it is clear that he desires agency. He does not want the doctor's reassurance that his prostate cancer is not his fault, a mere chance or accidental happening. Rather, he wants to know that his prostate was expended--hilariously "beat" (got to love that verb choice) through over-use. As Broyard concludes, "If only the patient could be allowed to see his illness as not so much a failure of his body as a natural consumption of it."
Thursday, March 18, 2010
Erosion
"Adults had a drink, they said, to take the edge off, so that's how she came to understand growing up: erosion. She was all edges, on tender hooks, which is what she thought the expression was."
---Beth Ann Fennelly, excerpt from the poem "Waiting for the Heart to Moderate" in Tender Hooks
Sagging jaw-lines, drooping breasts and stomachs and behinds, fuzzy thinking, and enervated tempers---aging is the process whereby the sharpness, tautness, firmness, elasticity, flexibility and endurance of youth give way to softening edges of all sorts. Ironically, we seek one anaesthetic or another to bring us comfort, to soften us further, to numb us to the sharpness we perceive in our environment. However, Fennelly is wise enough to know that we lay down new sediment in addition to eroding. Aging isn't entirely a disappearing act.
---Beth Ann Fennelly, excerpt from the poem "Waiting for the Heart to Moderate" in Tender Hooks
Sagging jaw-lines, drooping breasts and stomachs and behinds, fuzzy thinking, and enervated tempers---aging is the process whereby the sharpness, tautness, firmness, elasticity, flexibility and endurance of youth give way to softening edges of all sorts. Ironically, we seek one anaesthetic or another to bring us comfort, to soften us further, to numb us to the sharpness we perceive in our environment. However, Fennelly is wise enough to know that we lay down new sediment in addition to eroding. Aging isn't entirely a disappearing act.
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
Plum Blossoms and Moonlight
Taken from the back of a box of Metropolitan Museum of Art Correspondence Cards featuring a plum blossom design modeled on a woodblock print by Suzuki Harunobu:
" One Japanese Poet said, 'On a spring night when the moon shines through a blossoming plum tree growing by the eaves, the moonbeams themselves seem filled with perfume.' "
" One Japanese Poet said, 'On a spring night when the moon shines through a blossoming plum tree growing by the eaves, the moonbeams themselves seem filled with perfume.' "
Sunday, March 14, 2010
Iron Bones
"Iron Bones Giving Birth to Spring"
"Learning from Bamboo's Lofty Spirit Though it is Hollow;
Following the example of Plum Blossoms Which Bloom on Iron Boughs"
"Before Peach and Pear Trees Come into Bloom, Winter
Plum Blossoms Spring out of Iron-like Trunks"
"Tested by Wind and Frost, Plum Blossoms Smell Stronger;
People Who Expect Nothing Have More Noble Quality"
---Wang Chengxi, titles from his paintings, collected in A Hundred Plum Blossom Paintings (1992)
Wang Chengxi, a contemporary painter of plum blossoms, continues a tradition in existence since the Tang Dynasty. In explaining his interest in the plum blossom, Chengzi echoes those of the artists and poets who preceded him who appropriated the plum blossom to signify the coming of spring in both the literal as well as the more figurative sense--rejuvenation after a difficult time, such as illness. Chengxi writes, "Braving snow and frost, plum trees blossom defiantly to spread their fragrance . The noble character and morals of the people can be likened to plum blossoms which are burst forth in adverse circumstances and bring encouragement to the world."
The plum blossom is one of the "Three Friends of the Cold" (which includes pine and bamboo, mentioned above) as well as one of "The Four Gentlemen" , which includes orchid (spring) bamboo (summer) and chrysanthemum (autumn). The plum blossom is an example of what we might call the spiritual underpinnings of the material world. The strength of the plum tree's "iron bones" which bring forth blossoms in abundance even amidst cold and ice offers us a narrative of resurrection.
Tomorrow's entry will feature plum blossoms once more to celebrate the advent of spring.
"Learning from Bamboo's Lofty Spirit Though it is Hollow;
Following the example of Plum Blossoms Which Bloom on Iron Boughs"
"Before Peach and Pear Trees Come into Bloom, Winter
Plum Blossoms Spring out of Iron-like Trunks"
"Tested by Wind and Frost, Plum Blossoms Smell Stronger;
People Who Expect Nothing Have More Noble Quality"
---Wang Chengxi, titles from his paintings, collected in A Hundred Plum Blossom Paintings (1992)
Wang Chengxi, a contemporary painter of plum blossoms, continues a tradition in existence since the Tang Dynasty. In explaining his interest in the plum blossom, Chengzi echoes those of the artists and poets who preceded him who appropriated the plum blossom to signify the coming of spring in both the literal as well as the more figurative sense--rejuvenation after a difficult time, such as illness. Chengxi writes, "Braving snow and frost, plum trees blossom defiantly to spread their fragrance . The noble character and morals of the people can be likened to plum blossoms which are burst forth in adverse circumstances and bring encouragement to the world."
The plum blossom is one of the "Three Friends of the Cold" (which includes pine and bamboo, mentioned above) as well as one of "The Four Gentlemen" , which includes orchid (spring) bamboo (summer) and chrysanthemum (autumn). The plum blossom is an example of what we might call the spiritual underpinnings of the material world. The strength of the plum tree's "iron bones" which bring forth blossoms in abundance even amidst cold and ice offers us a narrative of resurrection.
Tomorrow's entry will feature plum blossoms once more to celebrate the advent of spring.
Saturday, March 6, 2010
The Word of the Street
[...] "Don't you know that the secret to understanding a city and its people is to learn--what is the word of the street?"
Then he went on to explain, in a mixture of English, Italian and hand gestures, that every city has a single word that defines it, that identifies most people who live there. If you could read people's thoughts as they were passing you on the streets of any given place, you would discover that most of them are thinking the same thought. Whatever that majority thought might be---that is the word of the city. And if your personal word does not match the word of the city, then you don't really belong there.
"What's Rome's word?" I asked.
"SEX," he announced.
"But isn't that a stereotype about Rome?"
"No."
"But surely there are some people in Rome thinking about other things than sex?"
Giulio insisted: "No. All of them, all day, all they are thinking about is SEX."
"Even over at the Vatican?"
"That's different. The Vatican isn't part of Rome. They have a different word over there. Their word is POWER."
"You'd think it would be FAITH."
"It's POWER," he repeated. "Trust me. But the word in Rome---it's SEX."
---Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat, Pray, Love (2006)
In this scene from Eat, Pray, Love, Elizabeth Gilbert reflects on why the city of Rome, the first leg of her year-long journey, is intensely pleasurable for her, yet does not afford her a sense of belonging. As her friend Giulio explains, experiencing such a sense of place requires that one's own "word" coincide with the "word of the street." Gilbert's "word" as she notes is "SEEKER" and thus she is out of sync with Rome's own point of orientation. She will remain a visitor and not a resident--she is "not fully living" in Rome. In the conversation that follows, Gilbert identifies New York City's "word" as "ACHIEVE," and distinguishes it from the word of Los Angeles, which is "SUCCEED." Stockholm's word is "CONFORM," and Naples' word is "FIGHT."
Gilbert's distinction between "achieve" and "succeed" rings true. This is one of those examples of words that we typically think of as interchangeable, yet are essentially different. In reading this, I'm also reminded of Henry James's efforts to distinguish between jealousy and envy, which I wrote about here. [Donald Sutherland's comment to Mary Tyler Moore in "Ordinary People" in which he declares that she is "very determined" but "not really strong" curiously comes to mind as well. ] This kind of exercise forces us to be precise, to think about what words mean, what they reference.
But the larger point of the passage is to reflect on the differences between space and place--to contemplate what makes a space "fit" with our own sense of ourselves. This is the difference between habitability and visitability. I've tried to think of a single word that describes my own hometown city (Washington DC and the metropolitan area that is its extension.) I think the word is "ANGLE." I'ts not suprising then that I have little desire to return except as a visitor. I am not sure of my own word--but it is not "ANGLE."
Then he went on to explain, in a mixture of English, Italian and hand gestures, that every city has a single word that defines it, that identifies most people who live there. If you could read people's thoughts as they were passing you on the streets of any given place, you would discover that most of them are thinking the same thought. Whatever that majority thought might be---that is the word of the city. And if your personal word does not match the word of the city, then you don't really belong there.
"What's Rome's word?" I asked.
"SEX," he announced.
"But isn't that a stereotype about Rome?"
"No."
"But surely there are some people in Rome thinking about other things than sex?"
Giulio insisted: "No. All of them, all day, all they are thinking about is SEX."
"Even over at the Vatican?"
"That's different. The Vatican isn't part of Rome. They have a different word over there. Their word is POWER."
"You'd think it would be FAITH."
"It's POWER," he repeated. "Trust me. But the word in Rome---it's SEX."
---Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat, Pray, Love (2006)
In this scene from Eat, Pray, Love, Elizabeth Gilbert reflects on why the city of Rome, the first leg of her year-long journey, is intensely pleasurable for her, yet does not afford her a sense of belonging. As her friend Giulio explains, experiencing such a sense of place requires that one's own "word" coincide with the "word of the street." Gilbert's "word" as she notes is "SEEKER" and thus she is out of sync with Rome's own point of orientation. She will remain a visitor and not a resident--she is "not fully living" in Rome. In the conversation that follows, Gilbert identifies New York City's "word" as "ACHIEVE," and distinguishes it from the word of Los Angeles, which is "SUCCEED." Stockholm's word is "CONFORM," and Naples' word is "FIGHT."
Gilbert's distinction between "achieve" and "succeed" rings true. This is one of those examples of words that we typically think of as interchangeable, yet are essentially different. In reading this, I'm also reminded of Henry James's efforts to distinguish between jealousy and envy, which I wrote about here. [Donald Sutherland's comment to Mary Tyler Moore in "Ordinary People" in which he declares that she is "very determined" but "not really strong" curiously comes to mind as well. ] This kind of exercise forces us to be precise, to think about what words mean, what they reference.
But the larger point of the passage is to reflect on the differences between space and place--to contemplate what makes a space "fit" with our own sense of ourselves. This is the difference between habitability and visitability. I've tried to think of a single word that describes my own hometown city (Washington DC and the metropolitan area that is its extension.) I think the word is "ANGLE." I'ts not suprising then that I have little desire to return except as a visitor. I am not sure of my own word--but it is not "ANGLE."
Thursday, March 4, 2010
Fortune Cookies Speak Truth
In the spirit of modernist poets and artists such as Marianne Moore and Joseph Cornell who juxtaposed the stuff and substance of high culture with pop cultural treasure, I offer you all of the fortune cookie fortunes that I am currently carrying in my wallet:
Take the advice of a faithful friend.
You find what you're looking for; just open your eyes!
Look forward to great fortune and a new lease on life!
Do not mistake temptation for opportunity.
Opportunity always ahead if you look and think.
You will always be surrounded by true firends. [sic]
Although a few of these fortunes sound a bit ominous, on the whole they offer solid advice and generous predictions about my future. Few things are as reassuring as a good fortune, or as disappointing as an unfavorable one. While some might place the fortune cookie in the realm of superstition, it is uncanny that so many people look for assurance, confirmation, and validation in material signs, whether from a beneficent sky, a successful shake of the Magic 8 Ball, or the serendipitous find of a four-leafed clover. Perhaps my favorite example is that of Mary Baker Eddy's reassurance during a troubling time upon opening a drawer and finding a rubber band that had curled into the shape of a heart. (Mary Ann Caws refers to this in her fabulous book on Joseph Cornell)
Take the advice of a faithful friend.
You find what you're looking for; just open your eyes!
Look forward to great fortune and a new lease on life!
Do not mistake temptation for opportunity.
Opportunity always ahead if you look and think.
You will always be surrounded by true firends. [sic]
Although a few of these fortunes sound a bit ominous, on the whole they offer solid advice and generous predictions about my future. Few things are as reassuring as a good fortune, or as disappointing as an unfavorable one. While some might place the fortune cookie in the realm of superstition, it is uncanny that so many people look for assurance, confirmation, and validation in material signs, whether from a beneficent sky, a successful shake of the Magic 8 Ball, or the serendipitous find of a four-leafed clover. Perhaps my favorite example is that of Mary Baker Eddy's reassurance during a troubling time upon opening a drawer and finding a rubber band that had curled into the shape of a heart. (Mary Ann Caws refers to this in her fabulous book on Joseph Cornell)
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
Let The Air In
"I said the mountains looked like white elephants. Wasn't that bright?"
"That was bright."
"I wanted to try this new drink. That's all we do, isn't it--look at things and try new drinks?"
"I guess so."
The girl looked across at the hills.
"They're lovely hills," she said. "They don't really look like white elephants. I just meant the coloring of their skin through the trees."
"Should we have another drink?"
"All right."
The warm wind blew the bead curtain against the table.
"The beer's nice and cool," the man said.
"It's lovely," the girl said.
"It's really an awfully simple operation, Jig," the man said. "It's not really an operation at all."
The girl looked at the ground the table legs rested on.
"I know you wouldn't mind it, Jig. It's really not anything. It's just to let the air in."
The girl did not say anything.
"I'll go with you and I'll stay with you all the time. They just let the air in and then it's all perfectly natural."
"Then what will we do afterward?"
"We'll be fine afterward. Just like we were before."
"What makes you think so?"
"That's the only thing that bothers us. It's the only thing that's made us unhappy."
The girl looked at the bead curtain, put her hand out and took hold of two of the strings of beads.
"And you think then we'll be all right and be happy."
"I know we will. You don't have to be afraid. I've known lots of people that have done it."
"So have I," said the girl. "And afterward they were all so happy."
"Well," the man said, "if you want to you don't have to. I wouldn't have you do it if you didn't want to. But I know it's perfectly simple."
"And you really want to?"
"I think it's the best thing to do. But I don't want you to do it if you don't really want to."
"And if I do it you'll be happy and things will be like they were and you'll love me?"
"I love you now. You know I love you."
"I know. But if I do it, then it will be nice again if I say things are like white elephants, and you'll like it?"
---Ernest Hemingway, "Hills Like White Elephants"
It isn't the unnamed operation that is the subject matter of this quote that interests me, but its painful recognition of the ephemerality of any moment of well-being or balance. That desire to return and recapture an earlier idealized state--things "like they were"-- is universal. Flinging open the window, or here in this passage, "let[ting] the air in" in the more clinical sense, seems to promise to end stuffiness, to restore simplicity and clarity. The girl knows better. Returning to the ideal state once the line has been crossed is a near impossiblity.
"That was bright."
"I wanted to try this new drink. That's all we do, isn't it--look at things and try new drinks?"
"I guess so."
The girl looked across at the hills.
"They're lovely hills," she said. "They don't really look like white elephants. I just meant the coloring of their skin through the trees."
"Should we have another drink?"
"All right."
The warm wind blew the bead curtain against the table.
"The beer's nice and cool," the man said.
"It's lovely," the girl said.
"It's really an awfully simple operation, Jig," the man said. "It's not really an operation at all."
The girl looked at the ground the table legs rested on.
"I know you wouldn't mind it, Jig. It's really not anything. It's just to let the air in."
The girl did not say anything.
"I'll go with you and I'll stay with you all the time. They just let the air in and then it's all perfectly natural."
"Then what will we do afterward?"
"We'll be fine afterward. Just like we were before."
"What makes you think so?"
"That's the only thing that bothers us. It's the only thing that's made us unhappy."
The girl looked at the bead curtain, put her hand out and took hold of two of the strings of beads.
"And you think then we'll be all right and be happy."
"I know we will. You don't have to be afraid. I've known lots of people that have done it."
"So have I," said the girl. "And afterward they were all so happy."
"Well," the man said, "if you want to you don't have to. I wouldn't have you do it if you didn't want to. But I know it's perfectly simple."
"And you really want to?"
"I think it's the best thing to do. But I don't want you to do it if you don't really want to."
"And if I do it you'll be happy and things will be like they were and you'll love me?"
"I love you now. You know I love you."
"I know. But if I do it, then it will be nice again if I say things are like white elephants, and you'll like it?"
---Ernest Hemingway, "Hills Like White Elephants"
It isn't the unnamed operation that is the subject matter of this quote that interests me, but its painful recognition of the ephemerality of any moment of well-being or balance. That desire to return and recapture an earlier idealized state--things "like they were"-- is universal. Flinging open the window, or here in this passage, "let[ting] the air in" in the more clinical sense, seems to promise to end stuffiness, to restore simplicity and clarity. The girl knows better. Returning to the ideal state once the line has been crossed is a near impossiblity.
Monday, March 1, 2010
Social Intercourse: Sounds Like a Drag
"I do not want to spend too long a time with boring people, but then I do not want to spend too long a time with amusing ones. I find social intercourse fatiguing. Most persons, I think, are both exhilarated and rested by conversation; to me it has always been an effort. When I was young and stammered, to talk for long singularly exhausted me, and even now I have to some extent cured myself, it is a strain. It is a relief to me when I can get away and read a book."
----W. Somerset Maugham, "The Summing Up"
I concur. Less conversation and less social engagement does a body good.
----W. Somerset Maugham, "The Summing Up"
I concur. Less conversation and less social engagement does a body good.
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